If your Classic Flight Reward booking on Qantas gets cancelled or rescheduled by the airline, Qantas has now made it easier to rebook your flight.

A new self-service tool on the Qantas website provides flexible rebooking options following involuntary cancellations and changes made to Qantas-operated reward flights.

Unfortunately, if you’ve used Qantas points to book a Classic Flight Reward seat on a partner airline which is changed or cancelled, and any alternative flights provided are not suitable, you’ll likely still need to contact Qantas. You may also still need to proactively contact Qantas to get your booking re-ticketed if you have a Classic Flight Reward booking on a partner airline that gets changed.

This new feature is also not available if you’re simply choosing to make changes to your Qantas booking, but the flight you booked is still operating as scheduled.

Nonetheless, this new feature is a big improvement for customers with Classic Flight Reward bookings when Qantas has to change or cancel flights! Here’s how it works…

Select a new flight in “Manage Booking”

If your Qantas flight is changed or cancelled, you should receive an email from Qantas Customer Services with updated flight details. This email contains a link to the Qantas website where you can manage your booking.

For example, I recently received this email after the Hong Kong-Melbourne flight I was booked on got cancelled:

When opening Manage Booking on the Qantas website, you then have the option to “Accept/Change” the new flight/s:

This then brings up a page that lets you select a new flight:

You can even search for a new flight within a few days either side of your originally-booked travel date.

You can choose to accept the “proposed flight”, or scroll down to choose any of the multiple other options presented.

On the date I originally booked, Qantas offered 17 alternative flights from Hong Kong to Melbourne. This included other flights on Qantas via Sydney, as well as options on partner airlines such as a direct Cathay Pacific flight. Many of the options did not otherwise have Classic Flight Reward seats available.

Regardless of which option you choose, there is no additional payment required.

Some of the alternate routings presented were actually quite creative and some involved travelling on an airline that is not a Qantas partner.

For example, one itinerary offered was with Air Niugini from Hong Kong to Brisbane via Port Moresby, with a connecting Qantas flight from Brisbane to Melbourne.

For some people, one of the new flight options presented might actually work better than the original flight.

Either way, it’s good that Qantas is offering choices to customers with cancelled flights – and making it easier for customers to self-serve online rather than having to call the contact centre!

A welcome change

This new tool should make it easier for Qantas Frequent Flyer members affected by Qantas flight changes and cancellations. Hopefully this is a sign of more investment to come in this area.

Another AFF member also recently posted on our forum that they received multiple rebooking options after their Dallas-Sydney flight on Qantas was re-timed.

You can read more about this and discuss this change on the AFF forum:

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 90 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include aviation, economics & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.